Home Again

Thank you all for praying for health, safety and God's direction on our trip.  Dave and I arrived back in Billings last Sunday at about 11:30 pm.   After being in the "system" for 36 hours we were both pretty exhausted and ready for a warm shower and a comfortable pillow.  Sleeping on the flights or in the terminals just didn't seem to meet our bodies need for rest.  We were greeted by a nice Arctic Blast as we left the airport to go home, it was all of 1 deg. outside, a far cry from what we were accustomed to in Ethiopia, 75 and sunny everyday.  Quite the shocker.  

Our work continues here as we try to decipher what God was showing us on our trip.  The need is endless in Ethiopia, we just want to be diligent to God's leading in the ministry of Ethiopia Hope and use His resources that He has blessed us with to make a tangible difference in a church in Ethiopia.  So your continued prayers for direction are greatly appreciated, as it is still unclear in our minds where our primary focus of ministry in Ethiopia should be.  We have wonderful friendships with two different churches, who are doing great things for God's kingdom in Ethiopia, each in their own ways.   It is truly a blessing to be a part of either one of their ministries.  

Stay tuned for more announcements at Harvest, and in the weekly for future trips to Ethiopia.   Here are some pics that might tug at your heart strings.  Some of these are from the Compassion project in Modjo, which provides resources for your sponsored children.  Enjoy!!!

Back to Addis

Yesterday we met with the officials for Bright Hope School and visited the school project.  They are beginning the last phase of the wall, and have started the second phase of the garden.  In the first phase of the garden they are beginning the second growing season, and rotation of crops.  It has been a successful first harvest.  They are use the proceeds from the sale of the produce and eggs to help supplement a lunch program for some of the neediest children who attend the school.  They are also using their resources to provide extra food and some treatment for the children with HIV.  These children get an additional boiled eggs each week from the chicken farm that the school is running.  This program has been a huge success as they are currently getting about 9500 eggs per month from 370 chickens.  They are doing as much as they can to help the children succeed in the classroom. 

Today we visited Acacia Village, and were given an extensive tour of the facilities, from Micheal Arrowood, one of CWA's staff members from the North Carolina office.  He has been living here in Addis for a while doing some quality control on the facilities.  It was a good visit and the building is beautiful.  Most of the children were napping while we were there so we didn't see any children, which was unfortunate. 

Dave and I are winding down our time in Addis.  We have learned a lot about the various programs that Harvest has been a part of over the past two years.  God is doing some great things in Ethiopia and were are meerly blessed to be apart of his work in this country.  God is really moving in this place.  Everywhere we have been there is some much need but it has been clear that God is working in everywhere.  Thanks for all of your prayers for this trip. 

 Aaron and Dave

Modjo

Hello,
Dave and I are currently in Modjo, visiting the Modjo Mesurite Christo Church and their Compassion programs.  One of the programs we visited today was their Child Survivor-ship Program.  They explained the what they are doing for the families with children up to 3 years of age.  This program gives assistance and training to the mothers as well as food, and medical supplies.  We met all 35 mothers who are part of the CS Program this morning at the Church for a coffee ceremony.  The welcome we have received at Modjo has been amazing.  The Child Survivor-ship Program is making a real difference in this community.   They have 15 more openings in the churches program,  so it would be really neat if Harvest could support 15 more families in this community.  The resources in this program are shared by all the families in the program.  It doesn't just change a child's life it helps the whole family, mother and father included.  Today we also were privileged to see two daughter churches that have been started in the rural areas around Modjo.  At one of the churches the farmer who owned the land gave it to the church in response to what God had done in his life.  He had been sick for years, without a cure from the local medical professionals.  His wife began praying for healing, after she started praying and attending the church her husband was cured from his sickness.  And because of his life change they gave half of their land to the church to start a rural daughter church.  They have witness many life changes in their neighbors, as about 30 people have given their lives to Christ as a result of this man's testimony.  This is truly an example of the power of a life changed by the Holy Spirit.  Tomorrow we have a meeting with the church elders and some of the Compassion Staff, to discuss some of the church's vision and future plans.  And then it is back to Addis to continue the last portion of the trip. 

Thanks for the prayers as we see where God is directing us with our Church here in Modjo!

Long plane rides, long chats and 24 hours later...

Dave Ulrichs and Aaron Koenigsberg are traveling to Addis Ababa, arriving on Feb 9th. Please pray for them as they meet with ministries in the Korah  District and go to Modjo to visit our partner church. May the Lord be go ahead of them to meet people that will direct us in the path we should be going down with our Humanitarian ministry of Ethiopia Hope.

Evidence of your contributions.

We recently received pictures from Bright Hope School in Addas Ababa showing the very exciting first harvest of the vegetables and eggs. These represent the ornaments that you purchased at Christmas. In less than a year you have greatly impacted this school, the children who attend the school and the surrounding community. Amesegenalew!!!!

Korah Distrcit Video

Here is a link to a video that was made to help bring awareness to the needs of the people in the Korah District. Our friend Sammy tells a little bit about his story and the people that Great Hope Church are reaching with the gospel

http://www.vimeo.com/13771428

Progress at Bright Hope School

The Chickens have finally arrived and the gardens are looking great.  Here are some updated pics from the school.   They will soon have eggs filling the egg laying stations and vegetables for the children when they come back to school this fall. 

Vegetable Garden

Egg Laying Hens

Egg Laying Stations

Vegetable Gardens

Progress at Bright Hope School

Here are some pictures of the continuing progress being made at Bright Hope School. Thanks for all your continued prayers for the projects and the community of Korah. We look forward to a time when can take over another team and continue serving within this great comminity.

Training on how to plant

Planting begins, Tefera in white shirt on left side

Building is complete on the section of wall we were working on in May.

Plastering up the cinder blocks.

Pics from the Bright Hope School Job Site

 

Left:  Phase 2 of the Wall:  210 meters of foundation almost complete.   Below:  Chicken House almost finished.  Above:  Derrick and Jen carrying a rather large rock with a barilla down to the wall.  Good Job guys.  Bottom:  Becky working hard with one of the ladies on the jobsite.  Group Photo:  Everyone enjoyed a soda on Thursday afternoon in celebration of a good week of work.   Friday was a government holiday.  

Pictures from Great Hope Church

Some girls enjoying there enjera for lunch at Great Hope Church in the Korah district. 

Almost Home

On Friday, we took the day off, due to the Ethiopia's Memorial Day, and spent the morning at Great Hope Church in the Korah neighborhood.  This church is the only evangelical church in the community of approximately 130,000 people.  There is about 500-600 kids who attend the various programs that are put on by the church.  Programs like a sports camp on Saturday mornings, after school teaching/training sessions, a school lunch program for the kids who otherwise wouldn't get any food or water at all.  They also have a ministry to the kids who are living at the dump.  The list of outreach programs that this church runs is endless.  Sound familiar?  We really had a good time helping out each day with the lunch program and so we spent several hours on Friday hanging out with the children.  Some of the guys on our team pitched in and help sand the rust off of metal bunk beds that they are going to use to for the 30 orphans that the church is taking in from the dump.  When we left the church amidst tears of joy, and sadness, we all truly believed that God is doing a mighty work through this small church.  


The rest of the day was spent gathering our things to come home, and doing some last minute shopping of gifts for family and friends.  We boarded the plane at 11:30 pm local time in Ethiopia.  We made it to Frankfurt and had an 8 hour layover so we ventured in to town.  We visited a local Cathedral that was bombed during World War II.   During the bombing, an ancient Roman Bath house was unearthed, and is currently on display next to the Cathedral.  It was nice to get out of the airport and get some fresh air.  We got some coffee and pastries at a little downtown cafe and then made our way back to the terminal to catch our flight to Denver.   While we were in route there was a medical emergency on the plane and we were detoured to Montreal Canada, to let the passenger off so that they could get her to the hospital.   Everything that we know is the she was in stable condition when she left the plane.  33 Hours after we left Addis we arrived in Denver.   So, consequently we missed our flight, the last one out of Denver, and are now staying in a hotel for tonight.  Everyone is exhausted mentally as well as physically.  They all did great throughout the trip, even though we had some adversity along the way.  Thanks for praying for us.  We arrive into Billings tomorrow morning at 12:48pm.  Look forward to seeing or talking with everyone about the trip when we get home.


Sincerely,
Aaron

Sad when I'm glad.

“O LORD, You understand my thought afar off.

You comprehend my path and my lying down,

And are acquainted with all my ways…” Psalm 139:2b-3

What a reassurance to know that God knows exactly what we are feeling as we complete day eight in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Today brought with it a huge mix of emotions: missing my girls back home, compassion for those with those little both spiritually and physically, joy, physical ailments, confusion in knowing how Christ wants me to respond, sadness in saying goodbye, all served with a side of EXTREME exhaustion.

As we began our day, I (along with others on our team) am fighting a cold, so I’m pacing myself pretty well. When the kids came out for recess, I decided that I would break from the work and hang out with them. After about 20 introductions of names I will never remember, we played a game of Ring Around the Rosie. This, I have found out is a girls’ game. The boys don’t like it. (There’s a surprise, I only know girl games.) We played some hand-jive games. Then I started getting requests for singing. They loved the five bars of Michael Jackson’s, “Man in the Mirror,” and then requested Beyonce and Shakira. The next obvious transition was, could I dance? I got lessons on how to dance Ethiopian style and then attempted to teach them the Macarena (after a refresher course from Ariel).

After returning to work, I showed two of the women we have been working with pictures of my girls. They kissed Aliya’s picture and told both Derrick and I they were “koinjo” (beautiful).  When I showed some of the kids, one boy said he wanted to marry my daughter… I told him that only God knows about that.

After lunch, our team treated all the hired workers with cokes. It was a huge hit and ended with them all being photogenic. We took lots of pictures and got hugs, amesayganalus (thank yous), and I love yous. Mantuwa, one of the women, gave the HUGEST, LONGEST hug. I felt like it was a testimony to the relationship we had built with them throughout the week…all without a translator for the most part. Ariel had the pictures we took developed and every one of the workers treasured it.

At 3pm, Aaron found out that it would be our last day at the job site because tomorrow is a holiday. The emotion was mixed for most of us. I was slightly relieved because I am so exhausted, but also so sad to say goodbye. These are people that I may never see again and I wonder, did I do enough to show them Christ’s love?

I was excited to see Betty, a 12-year-old girl from the church we’ve been serving lunch at, after school was dismissed (most of the kids stay on the school grounds for at least another hour). She told me she and her family were Protestant, that Jesus loves her and she loves Jesus. She and her friends all sang “Jesus Loves Me.” She also tattooed me on my arm: I love you.

After a long set of hugs and good-byes, we left the school and for dinner were entertained by authentic Ethiopian dancers while trying out authentic cuisine.

“Where can I go from your Spirit?

Or where can I flee from Your presence?

If I ascend into heaven, You are there;

If I make my bed in hell, behold You are there.

If I take the wings of the morning,

And dwell in the uttermost part of the sea,

Even there Your hand shall lead me.

And Your right and shall hold me.” Psalm 139:7-10

Grandma, tell my koinjo girls, momma’s on her way home!

A day without rain...

Kari writing:

Today was our first full day of work after being rained out early the last 2 days. We could see the rain clouds but thankfully they went around us. The wall is beginning to rise up out of the trench, which is very exciting. We are continuing to build relationships with the Ethiopian ladies we are working with. They are warming up to us more every day. Please pray for our “sistahs” (which is what they call us) and their families: Mentuwo, Cabinesch, Alum, and Dinkay are their names.

Today was Ryan’s birthday so the school surprised him by some of the classes marching down to the worksite, clapping and singing Happy Birthday. They made a circle around him and he was expected to make a speech, which he did admirably. Tonight the group is going out to ice cream in honor of his birthday.

At lunch, we again went to Sammy’s church to help serve lunch to the children in his feeding program. We heard some of the kids’ stories today and they are amazing and heartbreaking at the same time. Two sisters, 8 and 10 years old, traveled 500 kilometers after their parents died of malaria, to end up in the Kori district of Addis Ababa (where we are working). The church took them in and are caring for them and sending them to school.

We also toured the buildings the church has just acquired to begin an orphanage. When the buildings are redone they will house some of the children who now live at the dump. Looking at the buildings through American eyes it is hard to believe that they will be suitable to house children. The buildings have a disreputable past and are now being redeemed by God’s people for God’s work. We prayed for the project in the room that will become a classroom for the children to learn the social skills to be reintegrated back into society and to learn to sing and play and learn how to be children again.

Tuesday's adventures.

This morning we loaded up in the van and headed out for the jobsite. We noticed that our driver had among other things, a postcard hanging from his rearview mirror that read “Drive it like you stole it.” Very fitting for Sarafel (our driver); he definitely doesn’t waste time on the road! It takes special skill to drive the streets around here and we are glad Sarafel is handling that for us.

Things were a bit calmer at the work site today with just the Harvest team working and all the hellos and goodbyes from yesterday behind us. We spent the morning working on the wall and interacting some with the kids when they were on break or recess. Most of the kids can speak some English so we can ask each other questions and learn a bit about them.

We ate a quick lunch and headed over to Sammy’s church in the Cora district a couple of blocks from the school to serve lunch to a group of 50-60 kids. For many of these kids, it will be their only meal of the day. We call it Sammy’s church only because our main contact at the church is named Sammy. Just last night we had the opportunity to hear from Sammy and Pastor Antenue about their stories and what they are doing in and through their church. This helped give us some background about what challenges they are facing as well as what type of circumstances the kids are growing up in.

Now we have seen unending poverty on this trip, but walking through this part of town on our way to the church was witnessing a whole other level of extreme poverty. What a place – like nothing I’ve seen before. Yet, it was a great time at the church serving the kids lunch and chatting with them to and fro. This church is the only Christian church in this neighborhood of 130,000 and most definitely shining the light of Christ in a dark and hopeless place. Please pray for them.

We had to wrap up work early today because of the rain that cruised in around 2:30. We were bummed out by this but plan on getting to the jobsite earlier tomorrow to try and get a little more time in.

For dinner tonight we wandered over to a local establishment called Sister’s Café (I think). We went a little crazy with the bottled sodas and wracked up a tab for 17 pops! I guess we were thirsty. We are looking forward to tomorrow and seeing God work. Peace-

-Ryan

You say "Goodbye" and I say "Hello".....

Derrick here writing the blog tonight. Although this is my second time being in Ethiopia to work on the Bright Hope School Project, I’ve been able to manage avoiding the blogging duties up until now. As my wife can easily attest, I’m not the blogger of the family.

As I’ve come to expect while being in Ethiopia, today was very rewarding, a little bit random, and somewhat unexpected.

First of all, it was very awesome to see all of the progress that has been accomplished at the school over the past 6 months first-hand. They have completed the section of the wall that we started in November, are in the process of completing the construction of the 2 chicken houses, and have completed another significant portion of the foundation for the wall on the back-side of the school. It was also very good to see some of the folks that I met on our last trip and how excited they were that not only were we there, but that we had come back for a second time.

As the title suggests, today was a day of hellos as well as goodbyes. While it was the first day at the jobsite for the team from Harvest, it was the last day for the team from Journey, as they will be leaving for home tomorrow. We spent the morning working on the wall and re-aquainting ourselves with the process, which was very similar to the activities we did during the last trip; hauling rock, cement, sand, and mixing cement (just for the record, the rocks have NOT gotten any lighter!). The first day on the jobsite was significantly more efficient than the first time around, as the team from Journey has been able to get the process streamlined over the past week. After lunch, the staff of Bright Hope School held a coffee ceremony in honor of the team from Journey for the past week’s work, which we all participated in (complete with popcorn, music, collo, and of course coffee). We then got back to work for an hour or so, before we were forced to quit due to a tremendous downpour. We took advantage of the downtime to participate in an hour-long lesson in Amharic from one of the teachers (complete with handouts, quizzes, and classroom speaking).

After work, we came back to the Guest House and were fortunate enough to have dinner with our friend Sami (who we met on the last trip here) along with the pastor of Bright Hope Church, which is located very near the school we are working at. Sami and his pastor both shared their story on how they came to the Cora district and how they came to know Jesus. They also shared some of the ministries their church provides to that community. It was very encouraging and also very challenging on a personal level to hear how they are meeting the needs of their community in a very real and practical way.

Well, I need to get to bed, so I’ll end. Thank you all for your prayers and support!

Oh, and a very special hello to Madison, Breanne, and Aliya. Mommy and Daddy love you very much and can’t wait to see you again in a few days!

Derrick

We have arrived!!

We safely arrived Friday evening after 28 hours on 4 different planes, each offering a different experience. We were very happy to get to Ethiopia and be on solid ground. Aaron greeted us at the airport. We had no problems with our VISAs, passports, luggage or customs. Praise the Lord!! Today we were able to get out and take a drive into the countryside. It was really neat to see another side of Ethiopia. It was very green due to all the rain they have been getting and very beautiful. We drove to a resort type place to see a bridge that was built by the Porteguese during a war. It looked over a wide valley filled with terraced farming. We were all bummed because it had heated up and the baboons had moved up into the higher hills to graze. After a picnic in some random field, we headed back into Addis to do some more site seeing. Some of us visited the National Museum, which offered a little history into the kings and emperors of Ethiopia. We ate some very good ice cream and had pizza for dinner. Tomorrow is the election, so we will be staying close to the Guest House for the day. We have been informed that venturing out could be dangereous, so we figure it is better to be safe than sorry. We will try to post again tomorrow, but the internet has been working very sporactically.  Thanks for praying.

First Week is in the Books...

Here are some more pictures from the work that we did this week. Most of the week was spent working on the wall; however, one afternoon we went over and helped cultivate the garden. Everything here is done by hand. The workers in these pictures are from the community dump and are able to send their children to school while they work on the projects. They are also paid for their daily work. We are all very tired physically, but spiritually and emotionally our hearts are full of joy. We have spent five meaningful days rubbing shoulders with children and workers who have taught us what it is like to be filled with joy.

Tonight the team from our team arrives at 6:45pm local time.  I am pretty excited to see everyone and can't wait for them to experience some of the same things that we did this week.  Stay tuned for more news from Africa.  Oh by the way my Ahmaric is improving, but probably not as fast as the workers English. 

 

Leaving on a jet plane....

The Harvest team leaves tomorrow for Ethiopia to join Aaron and the Journey Church team. We are all very excited and ready to get on the ground to start working. Thanks to all you who have faithfully been praying for us as we prepare for our journey and who have supported us financially. I have to say that the 20 some hours traveling does not sound like much fun, but I am happy that I am traveling with a great group of people. I am not sure how Aaron survived. Thankfully he is not as much of a social thriving individual like I am. Please be praying that the volcanic ash cloud from Iceland does not impact our journey and we do not get held up traveling to or from Ethiopia. Keep checking back and depending on electricity we will write whenever we can and get some pictures posted.
Resting in His Provision,
Ariel Koenigsberg (and the rest of the team)